Multi-Lingual Radical Poetry and
Song in Britain and Ireland, 1770–1820

Aims and Objectives

Creation
of a four-nation interactive historical narrative, 1770-1820, to
supplement and amend current Anglo-centrically integrative narratives.

The
interrogation of cultural nationalism, notably Anthony D. Smith’s
ethno-symbolic interpretation, revising the relationship between
state-sponsored nationalisms and the subversive origins of the concept in
the fracturing of enlightened universalist republicanism.

Examine
the central role of radical poetry, emphasising bardism, in order to
produce a comparative study of the genesis and evolution of Irish,
Scottish, Welsh modernising nationalism as antitodes to the reactionary
Hanoverian state.

A
review of currently available radical poetry combined with a logistical
evaluation, as far as presently possible, of what might be archivally
retrievable.

An
analysis of the nature and quality of that poetry as it increasingly
became a form of persecuted writing leading to covert literary strategies
derived from Roman, Aesopian and post-Swiftian ironic modes.

The
vital question of the geographical publication histories of that poetry so
that its transmission across national boundaries can be tracked. This
would also help illuminate a sociological analysis of radical audiences.

An
account of the effects of governmental legislation and censorship on the
publication and distribution of radical poetry. Directly related to this
is governmental promotion of anti-radical, often parodical, loyalist
poetry.

The
value of radical poetry as bearing witness to the comparative impact and
influence of Republican America and France and the four national groups.

An
account of how the poetic war resulting from the French Wars led in two
contrary directions. British Imperialism and Chartism both synthesise the
political and poetical energies of the four national groups.

A
consideration of the capacity of poetry, arguably not only an autonomous
but inherently conservative medium, to supply documentation for
historians.

To
examine the complex relations between canonical and non-canonical poetry.

Summary

Wholly unlike the preceding Glorious Revolution on
which the constitutional and integrative integrity of the United Kingdom is
allegedly based, the reformist/republican events of the late eighteenth century
were subject to immediate suppression quickly followed by rapid deletion from
the national memory. MacAulay’s dictum that it had been an aberrant interlude,
sinisterly provoked by alien elements, was universally and happily received.

In consequence, the study of canonical Romantic poetry
insofar as it sought to perceive the political affiliations of these major
writers was profoundly belated. Due to new printing technology and
commercialization, the enormous volume of radical poetry provoked by the
political aspirations and consequent turbulence of the age was simply
abandoned.

In the last three decades, however, major historical
and research energies have been directed towards this area. This network seeks
to provide an unprecedented opportunity whereby key historical and literary
representatives from the four national groups might, in the terms of Pocock’s
New British History, become involved in a dialogue “in which the speakers act
upon each other, in determining who they are themselves”. This is not
necessarily a divisive activity. As Hugh Kearney has suggested: “The concept of
‘nation’ stresses the differences between a particular society and its
neighbours.” A Britannic approach in contrast would emphasize how much these
cultures have experienced in common.

The initial tendencies of the reform movement,
deriving from an mixture of pragmatic need for allies and a genuine mutual
sympathy, produced a collaborative effort, albeit English led, to form a
patriotic pan-British reform movement. Such extreme, even millennial,
optimistic anticipations were brutally terminated by the outbreak of war with
France.

This termination also led the more extreme elements in
the other three national groups to deny English constitutional primacy and to
evolve notions that their particular ancestral, mytho-historical histories and
subsequent republican-inclined political theories were the roads to enlightened
universal progress. This inherently unstable yoking of nationalism to
universalism could only lead to confrontation with an increasingly repressive
British state. This led to catastrophe in Ireland and profound, long-term
damage to reform in Scotland and Wales. In England, reforming energy was
diverted into the nascent labour movement. Irish historians now believe that
1798 was a seminal cause of Ireland’s rejection of Britishness. It would seem
that some current Welsh and Scottish scholarship is increasingly tending to
perceive this period as having a similar seminal importance. English historians
in contrast have focussed on the construction of a British imperial identity,
which is complicated by this project.